Posts tagged ‘grinding gears’

A friend of mine, Kyle Brockman, just wrote this amazing piece on capitalism as a note on Facebook. He’s allowed me to republish it here so I can share it with my Friendfeed and Twitter followers:

You know what really grinds my gears?

Today at 8:41pm

So, you are sitting around with your friends, having an intellectual discussion, and all of a sudden the word communism get mentioned. This in itself is not a problem, or at least, it wouldn’t be if it weren’t for a particular social nuance associated with the word. Inevitably as the bloody tides, someone will just have to add in a nasal ivy-league voice before acting smug:

“Well, communism is a good idea… in theory.”

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NO. COMMUNISM IS A TERRIBLE THEORY.

Every time any reasonable number of people have attempted to establish a communist society, they have managed to bring about not only total economic failure, but an inevitably fascist state that throws human rights out the window and ushers in a newfound era of human suffering. If communism is a “good theory”, then it is officially the poorest implemented theory in human history… ever.

Oh wait, here comes the self-righteous anti-capitalism brigade, demanding that someone acknowledge the suffering capitalism causes. Except… wait a second… It is completely, 100% impossible for capitalism to cause suffering. The very idea of capitalism is that all exchanges are voluntary and optional. If you think a trade or exchange is going to make you worse off, don’t make it. If you don’t have a choice, surprise! That’s not capitalism! Any supposed sins of capitalism are not only fabricated outright lies, but completely overshadowed by the bloodbath that is communism anyway.

This isn’t an opinion piece. There is no viewpoints for us to share or respect. Humanity already figured this out guys, it’s a solved issue. The earth is round, not flat: arguing otherwise makes you both ignorant and stupid, not “respectful” or anything of the sort. A centrally planned economy and group ownership of resources sounds like a clever idea to maximize productivity; so did the idea of the Earth being the center of the universe surrounded by ether-filled spheres that the other planets and bodies glide around on. Clever, but completely wrong.

Communism brought out the worst in humanity, and speaking fondly of it only makes you sound like an idiot for digging it out of its well-deserved grave.